


Seventh Age

by redheadandslytherin



Category: The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Tolkien Secret Santa 2017, Treebeard is still alive, the trees are alive
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-24
Updated: 2017-12-24
Packaged: 2019-02-19 17:58:38
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 662
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13128918
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/redheadandslytherin/pseuds/redheadandslytherin
Summary: Treebeard is still here, wandering in the world.Written for Tolkien Secret Santa 2017





	Seventh Age

Seventh age. He was quite probably the last one. He didn’t even know why he was still there – it just seemed like the right thing to do. Maybe it was meant to be. He was the eldest of them all, now, the eldest living being on this side of the sea.

Sometimes, he thought about crossing over, but then he remembered that boats were usually made out of wood. He would never chop down a tree. He would never take the bodies of his brethren to make his escape from this ruthless, dying place.

He listened in to the conversations of people when he spent time in their cities, standing in the shadows, using his old magic to conceal himself. Seventh age, he heard somewhere, from a young girl dressed in a mockery of the clothing from the old ages. Seventh age. The last time he spoke to anyone from the race of Man was at the beginning of the fourth. A young elf and a dwarf, of all things. They were seeking his guidance, wanted to see his forest in its full glory. He looked at the elf’s delighted face, barely a child compared to him, and hummed his agreement. They were gone after a few days. He’d never seen them again, but if the whispers of streams and plants were true, the two of them sailed long ago.

Seventh age. The very core of the earth was slowly suffocating from all the metal and cogs and wires and concrete and glass. What was left living was all whispering to him, asking about the old ages. He hummed and whispered and sometimes sang to them. If they still knew how to talk, still knew about him, they deserved that much.

Most of the trees were just trees now. Without voices, without personality. Oh yes, there were some that were just as fierce as the old ones, sometimes growing in shapes that left the humans baffled. Sometimes surviving lightning strikes that should have split them in half. Sometimes deciding to protect themselves by harnessing all the hate and poison a tree could possibly contain and make anyone who was foolish enough to still approach them or suffer great pains. He shook his head at those and kept a wide berth. Maybe he was the eldest one, the last one, but he was weary. The poison would sting, and he didn’t heal as fast as he used to. No need to waste his energy on such hate anyway.

He was standing in the shadow of a great building when he saw the one the humans dug up and turned upside down. The sapling – all of them were saplings compared to him – was furiously muttering to itself about showing the pesky humans that it would indeed survive, ordering his branches to function as roots.

Seventh age. It was winter, now, the cold a cutting pain even to him. He wondered, briefly if someone like him might develop something similar to the human condition he heard about in a hospital garden once. Arthritis. His joints ached and burned terribly in the cold. Could it be? He amusedly hummed at the thought. Maybe he was spending way too much time around the Second Children.

It was the season of the one habit he could not understand, no matter how hard he tried. They were cutting down pine trees, logging them into their homes and decorating them with lights, coloured spheres of glass and in some places, even baked goods. Then, they left them there for weeks, before divesting them of their ornaments and just throwing them out. He stood next to heaps of dead pines for a long time each year, quietly singing a mourning song before moving along.

That was all he was doing. Moving along. With no way to leave, and seemingly no way to die, he continued his vigil over all that was green. He was the eldest one. He would live on.

 


End file.
